White Room

About the White Room

The White Room provides current information relating to new technologies for energy efficiency. Stay connected with the latest news, events, and scientific breakthroughs in this fast moving sector. Use our filters on the left or click here to send a suggestion for content to add.

French company Schneider Electric has built a campus of interconnected buildings as a test bed and proving ground for advanced sensor, measurement, analysis, and control technologies that promise to improve building energy efficiency by an average of 30 percent.

Demand response company EnerNOC has launched EfficiencySMART, a line of business software designed to help companies better control their spending on energy. EnerNOC’s move comes as part of a general shift among demand response aggregators into the broader fields of energy efficiency and management.

A group of researchers at UC Santa Barbara is leading research efforts into integrated building design, in which active control of indoor airflows could greatly improve the ventilation and efficiency of heating and cooling in buildings.

In an effort to save energy, major HVAC and thermostat companies have been turning to "smarter" thermostats -- wireless, connected thermostats that can often be set up online. These new smart thermostats are expected to be more user-friendly than earlier versions.

China currently does not have demand response as we know it, but--partly as a result of recent regulations--a subsidiary of China's State Grid Corporation has selected Honeywell to participate in a project to study demand management and advanced energy management in buildings.

Cisco Systems introduced a new home energy management system with a countertop touch-screen display that allows users to monitor and program home energy use. The system will undergo a year-long pilot test with customers of Duke Energy.

Two environmental engineers at Clemson University have received a grant from the U.S. Dept. of Defense to create a new type of energy efficient Subsurface Thermal Energy Storage (STES) system that uses a conventional heat pump to move heat between buildings and the ground.

The Department of Energy's Building Technologies Program launches its latest challenge on Wednesday: an initiative to develop a $100 wireless submeter. The hope is that submeters can help building owners and tenants better understand energy use and help solve the split incentive issue.